Post navigation

James Fearnley (The Pogues): Great Scott, Boston, 9-18-2016

The small but enthusiastic crowd at Boston’s Great Scott were treated to a great night of music and banter by Pogues legend James Fearnley and friends. With accordion strapped on and in fine voice (despite complaints of a sweaty, smelly hand from holding the accordion), James took us through almost two hours of his post-Pogues material which he described in finest Yorkshire English as either “fast as fuck or slow as shite”. The material was pulled from the 1996 release he did with the Low and Sweet Orchestra and (I’m guessing) new material from the upcoming Cranky George release and despite early on telling us he would not play any Pogues material no matter how hard we stared at him the band ended the night with Drunken Boat (or at least that’s what I remember – corrections welcome). Tonight was a ton of fun and the band (basically a pick-up band for 3 shows – Boston, NYC and the Murphy’s Irish fest) had a tonne of laughs with former Dropkick Murphys Marc Orrell cracking up though out the night – I wish I know who the rest of the band were but introductions only got as far as the bass players first name – George – before taking a detour to a story about James trying to join Boy George’s Culture Club.. Mark Lind of Ducky Boys fame open up with some great acoustic roots rock with a nod to Springsteen.